How does a midrange driver differ from low/woofer

[corElement]

Something I've been trying to understand because almost all budget floorstander speakers have a midbass driver and woofer and tweeter but only a few with proper crossed over (600hz+ to 3000hz for example on the wharfedale 10.5) midrange crossover.

Is there a reason why the crossovers of most other speakers are 200-300hz to 2000/2200hz?

Is there a huge difference in quality of sound with a proper crossed over midrange or is the difference because of the driver used?

for example I was looking at the dali ikon 6 it has 2 identical looking woofers externally but one is a midrange and other is a proper woofer.

Can someone explain this to me so I can understand?

 

[Anil kumar]

Hi, in a 3 way configuration xover that crosses over from the woofer to the midrange at 400 Hz and from the midrange to the tweeter at 2 khz. A different 3-way may xover at 500 Hz and 1 kHz. They both have a 'midrange' but each reproduces a different range of frequencies. The difference is simply the range of frequencies each is designed to reproduce and will vary from brand to brand & type of cone material used. Some horn & paper cone tweeters can produce quite a bit of midrange.



Anil

FEVICOL as vinyl cleaner :yahoo:

 

[corElement]

So if I took dali speakers for example which have similar looking front drivers but have the true mid crossover meaning they have a true mid driver, they look the same but internally theyre different?

 

[Adhiraj]

I think these are using a dome midrange and a ribbon tweeter coupled to two woofers.The woofers are identical and also produce the same frequencies.The midrange comes from the dome you see above the woofer and the high from the slit above the dome.

 

[corElement]

Specs say

Description: 3-way, bass-reflex, floorstanding loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1.1" (28mm) cloth-dome tweeter, 0.7" (17mm) ribbon tweeter, two 6.5" wood-fiber/pulp-cone woofers. Crossover frequencies: 800Hz, 3.2kHz, 14kHz. Frequency response: 37Hz20kHz, 3dB. Sensitivity: 91.5dB/2.83V/m.

Ok, nevermind the dali, how about these : sorry for the high res, just to let you guys see closer, the 2nd driver is apprantly the mid, how come the woofers and the mid look exactly the same?

 

[corElement]

Appears to be the Dali Ikon 6. If so, then
2 x 6.5" Cone drivers for Bass/Mid (Lower dedicated for Bass, Upper for Mid)
1 x 1" approx Soft Dome Tweeter for High Frequency
1 x (1" x 2") Ribbon as Super-Tweeter

Crossovers are set as
Bass Woofer --> Mid at 800Hz
Mid --> Dome Tweeter at 3,200Hz
Dome Tweeter --> Ribbon Super Tweeter at 14,000Hz

To answer corElement's question, every loudspeaker manufacturer has their own sort of implementations with different crossover settings. There's no thumb-rule to follow as such since a Soft dome tweeter will behave different from a metal dome or a ribbon. Similarly, when it comes to Midrange, the driver dia and the material used plays an important role as to where the crossover can be ideally set.

Typically, Wharfedale follow their own based on the materials they use, the size of the cabinets, magnets, drivers etc.

Dali in their Ikon 6 is using exactly identical dia drivers, one acting as bass while the other as a midrange. The magnets could be different as these info are not shared by them.

Again, in another series of Dali, you may see altogether a different sort of implementation, hence no hard-&-fast rule!

Yes thats basically my question.
So they "do" make changes to the internals even though they might look the same from outside.

nice, I'd have been a bit =\ if they used the same drivers without any change and just put it on the crossover.

 

[suri]

So if I took dali speakers for example which have similar looking front drivers but have the true mid crossover meaning they have a true mid driver, they look the same but internally theyre different?

hi corElement-

these look like baffle-step-compensated-design loudspeakers

there will be a baffle-step-compensation inductor between the upper and lower woofer- you will not see that inductor between the woofers if you looked inside the cabinet - it will be on the crossover between the wiring. - these dali ikon 6s are 3.5 way - read the third paragraph here-

http://stereophile.com/floorloudspeakers/706dali/index3.html

read more here - Zaph|Audio - ZRT - Revelator Tower

the page starts with a two-way and lower down on the page is a 2.5 way.

this 2.5 way design uses the lower woofer to compensate for SPL loss of midrange frequencies - called baffle step diffraction loss - google this - makes for interesting read.

 

[Hari Iyer]

The cross-over frequencies also depend upon the order of the filter (First order, 2nd order, 3rd order etc..). If its a first order filter the driver should be able to handle atleast 3 Octaves of frequcies on either side of the cross-over point ie. the driver needs to have wider frequency response for a smooth transition between the lows-mids-highs. Also the resonationg frequency of the tweeter decides where the tweeter is crossed over at. The golden rule is to have the tweeter crossed at least 2.5 Octaves above the resonating frequency if its a first order filter. Hence to build a 2-way speaker with 6 dB/octave filter will be a challenge as you do not get that wide-band drivers to handle both the lows & mids well.

 

[suri]

Hence to build a 2-way speaker with 6 dB/octave filter will be a challenge as you do not get that wide-band drivers to handle both the lows & mids well.

here is one that does a fine job with scanspeaks -

Zaph|Audio - ZRT - Revelator Tower

 

[suri]

you can apply for the Darwin Awards).

hehehhe!

a link - The Darwin Awards

 

[corElement]

Ahhhh so much to read and learn from this thread *bows to all* I'm just glad I'm actually understanding certain chunks of it to learn the larger chunks and not going over my head.

 

[pungan]

Is it good to have dedicated midrange driver, generally what i have seen one tweeter and two woofers for midrange and low frequency handling.

what do you guys think of Paradigm Monitor 7 speakers.

 

[Hari Iyer]

My experiences is that fewer the number of drivers in the speaker system the better it will sound, as the number of parameters / constraints also increases with the quantaties of the drivers added. More number of drivers usually does not mean the system will sound better rather it will worsen the situation particularly in the area of impedance matching, power transfer, sensitivity mathcing between drivers, cross-over network and driver placement on the baffle so that phase-shifts between drivers are kept to minimum due to overlap of frequencies near the pass-band. Also there will be a kind of notch at (-3dB) at each cross-over point which needs to be handled by clever selection of the cross-over frequencies of the drivers.

 

[corElement]

Oh my gawd, just received my tower upgrades...... the single midrange on it completely rapes my previous midx2. They may look the same but sound is completely different and atm just going crazy at the dramatic difference in clarity from precious one and present.